Did you know that the Earth has a fever all the time? This fever is kept in check by ocean and air currents attempting to cool the hot equatorial region of the Earth. However, the Earth is not very efficient when it comes to lowering this fever through that process because the process itself creates rising and sinking air. Where air is warm, it rises, where it is cold, it sinks.
Think about packing an ice chest- would you put the ice on the bottom of the chest or the top? If you said the top, you are right. Cold air sinks thus keeping your food and drinks cool as well.
It is the same process in the atmosphere (in a way). The massive circulations on the on Earth are called Hadley Cells… see the following image.
Think about packing an ice chest- would you put the ice on the bottom of the chest or the top? If you said the top, you are right. Cold air sinks thus keeping your food and drinks cool as well.
It is the same process in the atmosphere (in a way). The massive circulations on the on Earth are called Hadley Cells… see the following image.
Image depicting a Hadley Cell. Photo: http://apollo.lsc.vsc.edu/classes/met130/notes/chapter10/single_cell.html
High pressure means air is sinking. If you go to Antarctica you are actually visiting a desert! I know that seems odd but the central region of Antarctica receives a negligible amount of precipitation a year; however, whatever does fall stays there because it is so cold! The reason Antarctica is a desert is due to the Hadley Cell circulation…low pressure (or rising air and storms) at the equator and sinking air at the poles (or clear skies with no precipitation). There are more cells in between the equator and the poles but this is the “gist” of the process.
Hurricanes are just one more part of these massive circulation processes on the Earth. They are the way the atmosphere can fix the disparity between warm and cold, or low and high pressure. It is always hurricane season somewhere on Earth- it is basically a 365 day conveyor belt of storms coming out of the tropics. Warm air from the tropics rises into moisture laden air and forms a giant monster that uses an engine of heat from the ocean. When the hurricane moves into northern or southern latitudes it disperses that heat into the air and water, the air sinks, and the hurricane dies. If the ocean temperatures are warmer at the tropics and farther north or south, this cycle becomes more violent and persistent. If the ocean temperatures are cooler at the tropics and farther north or south, the cycle is slower and more spread out.
Here is a graphic of how a hurricane forms and the typical tracks that they take:
Here is a graphic of how a hurricane forms and the typical tracks that they take:
Process involved in making a tropical system. Photo: http://www.weatherwizkids.com/Hurricane_formation.gif
The orange areas in this image represent the areas that tropical systems typically form. The lines and arrows depict the tracks of tropical systems. Notice each track takes hurricanes from the equator to the north or south or, to put it another way, from hot to cold: Photo: http://www.comet.ucar.edu/nsflab/web/hurricane/312.htm
The following section is speculative. There is no way of proving that this is true or that it did happen; however, science is a matter of speculation and hypothesis. If the evidence can prove the theory then it is viable. Please remember this as you read on:
I did research in college on a theory related to this. I thought that when the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs struck the Earth it rapidly heated the oceans- especially in the tropical latitudes. After going through databases and books I found that some scientists investigated this theory and hypothesized that multiple "Mega Hurricanes" formed due to the extremely hot ocean temperatures.
The water around the region of impact of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago superheated to over 120 degrees. Quickly a huge storm formed over this superheated water, or a hypercane. Kerry Emanuel of MIT says that when he was playing with his model of hurricanes and typed in a water temperature of over 120 degrees he found that the wind speed of the hurricane became over 500 miles per hour!!! In addition these hurricanes may have been larger than the entire United States!
Emanuel theorizes that particles from the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs are found around the world because of these “hypercanes.” The hypercanes pulled pieces of the earth high into the atmosphere and distributed them around the world as they tore across the tattered surface. Another way these giant monster storms can form, according to Emanuel, is through the heating of the ocean from an underwater volcano.
Of course, once the hypercane moved out of the region of superheated water it cooled and turned into a normal hurricane and then just low pressure; still the hypercane cycle continued across the earth until the excessive ocean temperatures equalized (and at that point the entire ocean was warmer). It is hypothesized that these mega-storms contributed to the extinction of the dinosaurs.
I no longer have access to the article that I used for this research (it was six years ago) but I was able to find a shorter version of his theory on this page, if you are interested.
http://alum.mit.edu/pages/sliceofmit/2009/08/14/what-do-you-know-about-hypercanes/
Also, if you want to watch TV’s dramatic cinematic take on the subject please watch this video on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTxj3M3XKcQ
If you have any questions feel free to ask. Thanks for reading.
I did research in college on a theory related to this. I thought that when the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs struck the Earth it rapidly heated the oceans- especially in the tropical latitudes. After going through databases and books I found that some scientists investigated this theory and hypothesized that multiple "Mega Hurricanes" formed due to the extremely hot ocean temperatures.
The water around the region of impact of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago superheated to over 120 degrees. Quickly a huge storm formed over this superheated water, or a hypercane. Kerry Emanuel of MIT says that when he was playing with his model of hurricanes and typed in a water temperature of over 120 degrees he found that the wind speed of the hurricane became over 500 miles per hour!!! In addition these hurricanes may have been larger than the entire United States!
Emanuel theorizes that particles from the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs are found around the world because of these “hypercanes.” The hypercanes pulled pieces of the earth high into the atmosphere and distributed them around the world as they tore across the tattered surface. Another way these giant monster storms can form, according to Emanuel, is through the heating of the ocean from an underwater volcano.
Of course, once the hypercane moved out of the region of superheated water it cooled and turned into a normal hurricane and then just low pressure; still the hypercane cycle continued across the earth until the excessive ocean temperatures equalized (and at that point the entire ocean was warmer). It is hypothesized that these mega-storms contributed to the extinction of the dinosaurs.
I no longer have access to the article that I used for this research (it was six years ago) but I was able to find a shorter version of his theory on this page, if you are interested.
http://alum.mit.edu/pages/sliceofmit/2009/08/14/what-do-you-know-about-hypercanes/
Also, if you want to watch TV’s dramatic cinematic take on the subject please watch this video on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTxj3M3XKcQ
If you have any questions feel free to ask. Thanks for reading.
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